


Surface Detail

by ars_belli



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Death Eaters, F/M, First War with Voldemort, No House of Gaunt, The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, Wordcount: 5.000-15.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-05
Updated: 2013-06-05
Packaged: 2017-12-14 02:10:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/831512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ars_belli/pseuds/ars_belli
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“The enemy of a good plan is the dream of a perfect plan.”  Voldemort cannot defy Clausewitz' tenet, but for a night he can try.  For a night, he moves his pieces from the board itself, where it matters not what things are, but what they seem to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Surface Detail

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alley_Skywalker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alley_Skywalker/gifts).



> My Lestrange head-canon rather got the better of me: there's a lot of un-beta'd French in here. Please rap me over the knucles if there is an error.  
> For some reason the HTML punctuation looks better in a serif font, so if something looks odd, try changing the site skin.  
> The "You are my Master..." exchange is adapted from Julian May's novel _The Adversary_. I have also mentioned the illustrious Marvolo and Valery lines from [Two Worlds and In-Between](http://archive.skyehawke.com/story.php?no=4039&chapter=1&font=&size=) by [Minerva McTabby (McTabby)](http://archiveofourown.org/users/McTabby/pseuds/Minerva%20McTabby), a stupendously under-regarded fic.

Bellatrix perched within the fissure, waiting below the rim, trying to ignore the stone gash behind her that looked as if the Titans themselves had gouged the rock with their axes. There was more than darkness in those shadows. Not everything that stumbled into that abyss had returned. Her hands clasped her wand so tightly that she imagined them never unfurling and the fire in her muscles had long since passed into a wordless, mindless agony of tension. Yet he would come, and so she waited.  
“Nothing,” announced a calm voice, slightly distant.  
“This sector clear,” Bella heard in reply, in the sort of tone that very much wished it wasn't.  
“Holding position,” carolled a third.  
There was a pause, the Aurors waiting for an order that never came. The abyss had claimed their leader before she had. Along with, unfortunately, the rest of Bellatrix' battle group.  
“What now? Spread out?”  
The first voice again.  
“No, idiot! Each of you, maintain your squad's positions.”  
Yet another! Bellatrix shook her head. Not single Aurors, as claimed by their intelligence, but a squad of six per voice. The Dark Lord had mentioned Rookwood's diversion, but evidently their spy in the Department was no longer protected by his Ravenclaw history and half-blood heritage. She shied away from considering the other spy, but her mind persisted. What would it cost Rodolphus, if he were seen here tonight? What would it cost them? Yet she had called for reinforcements and no-one else she knew was mission-less. _Well,_ said a ruthless, nagging voice in her mind, _at least you'll die together, as you've never lived._ Twelve Aurors each! Her Portkey reappeared at the corner of her eye. It was the only warning before a sudden Legilimantic dart pierced her mental defences. She whirled, curses on her tongue, but her efforts to fend off the probe were neatly countered by a non-verbal Imperius. For a sickening moment Bellatrix found herself willingly leap head-first into the darkness. Then her rescuer spoke.  
“Trust me, Bella. Stop fighting.”  
She did, implicitly. His hands encircled her and pulled her backwards. She used that instant to jab at the probe, which was busy trickling through another layer of Occlumency. Its own defences broke easily: she saw the ornamental clasp which restrained her own dark curls, inhaled their scent as they tumbled nearly to the slim waist that she held and beyond that registered her wand moving, even as she felt herself flick the walnut in her fingers to deactivate the curse primed into it.  
“Keep that spell, you'll need it,” she somehow heard and said simultaneously.  
The synchronicity was too much! Bellatrix fled back into her own mind. Senses regained, she found herself eye-to-eye with her knight in shining armour. The half-light revealed a grin slithering onto his unmasked face. Then familiar fingers suddenly tugged at her own and pulled her from the abyss into the light.  
“Stop—! Antonin, wait!”  
But there was no time, for the Aurors had seen them and they were very suddenly running the gauntlet. 

The enemy spell-work was accurate even from a distance. Jets of light spattered off the Death Eaters' shields while their assailants were closing rapidly. If they managed a successful encirclement—. Well, it would be a most undignified way to become a family ghost.  
 _Yes, let them come,_ she heard Antonin think.  
She saw the plan he projected through the Legilimantic bond, along with the yearning entreaty:  
 _Your own will has allowed me in. Let me return the compliment._  
The Killing Curse dropped one Auror. Her flash of triumph faded with the emerald beam: Bellatrix could have used a minor jinx for all the difference it made! The endless volley of hexes was flung at them with the same fervour as before. Soon their shields would weaken and shatter. Then they would be forced onto the offensive. Shortly after, they would undoubtedly die.  
 _You shrank from the conjunction before, but now there is no time, no choice._  
Steeling herself, Bellatrix paused at the mental threshold. She crossed it and knew that he felt her reply:  
 _Strategy to let them encircle us, yes. Break the weak point of their circle, knowing that they are inhibited by avoiding themselves. But first we have to survive that long._  
The fear was bright in her mind, swiftly overwhelmed by adrenaline. His response was mere amusement.  
 _We will. Haven't we just seen to that?_

With a faint 'pop,' the last Ministry thug vanished. The Death Eaters knew better than to follow, having often seen the effects of an over-zealous comrade pursuing a Hit Wizard through a half-formed, emergency anti-apparition ward. Trembling, Bellatrix rounded on her companion:  
“Have you lost your mind? The _risk_ , Antonin, didn't you think at all before you charged off to rescue me—”  
He shook off her grasp at his sleeve and started strolling towards the edge of the anti-apparition ward. His baritone was perfectly composed in reply:  
“Would you have preferred not being rescued? Fetching as you might look chained to a wall, I do prefer you out of custody.”  
She spluttered at his back, catching up by virtue of longer legs and pent-up energy. Her wand remained at the ready.  
“That is _not the point_! There is a reason that the Dark Lord makes his Inner Circle wear masks, but no, you had to let half of Magical Law Enforcement see you and live—”  
He stopped abruptly, seizing her wand arm before she could hex him. His fingers clamped around her wrist, then loosened as she moved to put away her wand.  
“And what did they see, Bella?”  
She retorted to the nape of his neck, incensed that he didn't bother to face her:  
“A team of Dark wizards in the Ministry's very own safe-rooms, some very deadly spell-work and a wizard who will surely be arrested the minute he returns home! You _fool_ Antonin!”  
Left hand still cautiously resting around her wrist, the wizard in question used the other to probe the nothing of the magical barrier. He studied the oil-slick waves of colour his touch produced.  
“A few suspected Death Eaters killed by virtue of their own stupidity, one that panicked and called for help, only to be rescued by someone who didn't bother with a mask, much less an alibi? Most unprofessional, that must be their conclusion.”  
Antonin paused. Hearing no retort, he released Bellatrix' wand arm. He pulled out a pocket watch and examined it idly, attention still on the barrier.  
“I daresay we shall leave before the hour. Are you going to help, or shall I continue to admire your rather splendid imitation of a volcano?”  
Pause notwithstanding, Vesuvius was rapidly gearing up for a second eruption.  
“We almost _died_ for your grand Legilimantic experiment—”  
“—which saved only your life—” he inserted mildly.  
“Yes...” the sudden explosion trailed off.  
He stopped, smiling as he turned to face her. The witch's thin, dark eyebrows twisted into a frown.  
“ _Only_ my life. You sent the others to their deaths.”  
She cocked her head to one side, contemplating.  
“Well, we send spies to the Ministry, it makes sense for them to return the favour.”  
“Does it bother you?” probed Antonin.  
“It does raise the possibility of you sending me off that way.”  
He roared with laughter. Throwing his head back had emphasised Antonin's neck muscles and the strong line of his jaw. She couldn't help but notice.  
“Oh, never! I would kill you myself! Who else is a duellist to match?”  
That was near sacrilege! Bellatrix took his hands to cover her dismay. They were shockingly warm as he pulled her closer. She knew better than to preach about the Dark Lord in Antonin's company, so she let the implied insult rest. After all, there were other things to capture her attention: the quiet, unperturbed beat of his heart; the smell of cologne that she recognised as an old Christmas present; his cheek normally pressed against her own, but relegated by her heeled boots to brush her jawline. The tension in her muscles never dissipated until long after a fight, but this time it seemed amplified. Impetuously she released his hands and caught her arms around his neck. Startled, he leaned away, but not before she pressed her lips to his. Laughing softly, he shook his head.  
“That is not what you want from me, Bella.”  
The watch still dangled from his pocket, hands ticking across midnight. Quite suddenly, she understood. She felt his shoulders shift beneath her arms, bone and muscle returning to their original configuration. The false-Antonin was still smiling as he extricated himself from her embrace. She ought to reach for her wand, she knew, or at least draw away, but Bellatrix stood mesmerised. For a moment she saw Antonin a foot taller than usual, but then he was thinning, shedding the muscle of so many months of fighting. His tan faded away too, leaving pale skin stretched over cheekbones sharp enough to deflect the Killing Curse by themselves. She was quite powerless to do anything but stare.  
“Do you like what you see, Bella?”  
Antonin's rich baritone had been replaced by a cool, measured tenor.  
“M—My Lord?”  
“I seem to be an object of no small fascination to you.”  
Cheeks flushing, Bellatrix averted her eyes.  
“This—this was all to prove a point, my Lord?”  
“Oh, quite. You see it, do you not?”  
Her reply was barely audible, directed at the hem of his robes.  
“That Ant — Dolohov — is replaceable. That I am impatient or inattentive or,” her eyes flickered closed as she steeled herself to continue, “Or unworthy of a position in your Inner Circle.”  
Bellatrix didn't need to raise her eyes to know that her Lord's fingers had lifted. She felt the gesture in her bones: _Desist._  
“While all of these things are true,” and surely she was not imagining the Schadenfreude in his tone, “They are also obvious.”  
Both command and rebuke went unspoken: “And I would hardly need to perpetuate such a diversion to illustrate them, so kindly continue until your brain runs dry of ideas.”  
The silence was stifling. Embarrassment dragged a long-forgotten memory from some dusty corner of her brain: throat constricted and heart pounding as she stood before her parents and the Headmaster and the Deputy Headmistress, trying to articulate that yes, Sirius and Andromeda might have been Blacks of the purest sort but _that_ hardly excused their consorting with Mudbloods, which of course had warranted an Entrail-Expelling Curse; that no, she had no desire to be expelled and sent to Durmstrang and that yes she was truly, deeply remorseful (but only insofar as she had been unable to cast the Cruciatus on the pair of them instead!); suddenly realising that McGonagall knew all of this somehow (for Legilimency was unknown to her then) and that for all Dumbledore's power he was the fool wanting to award everyone a second chance, whereas the one that stood in his shadow was the true danger.  
“Poor Minerva! Time has bestowed its affections on her more than me, I daresay. So many years climbing the ranks of the Aurors, forgotten already, leaving no epitaph.”  
Her Lord's voice broke through the fog of recollection. His message was plainer this time: Bellatrix Black must never be second. A lesson which, thanks to her family, she knew already.  
“They all burn so brightly, those with an aptitude for the Dark Arts.”  
The Dark Lord fell silent again, watching her. Challenging her to speak. All the pieces were lain out for her now. She just had to make them fit.  
“Not Rodolphus,” she whispered. “Not the obvious one, but his second! My mind is defenceless to yours but to complete the link required the one person I trust and who trusts me in return, he in whose mind I might be comfortable! Then the mission was a test, of course, but not the simple one of loyalty that the rest failed, the one for...”  
Bellatrix paused. Was she certain? She rotated the puzzle in her mind again:  
“Dolohov boasted of the spy in Dumbledore's court. Snape, we all assumed. Yet he hinted that someone from the old guard had left too—”  
“He has been punished for it. Dolohov ought not to trust his son so freely. Do remember that, Bella.”  
The voice was still cold, but there was no displeasure in it now.  
“Someone nominated me for the Concilium,” she breathed.  
“The first woman ever granted the honour. It caused rather a stir.”  
“Granted the honour of nomination, true. But not the first woman in the Concilium, my Lord. One to replace the one who has left.”  
At last Bellatrix had the courage to meet those eyes. For a long time the Dark Lord said nothing and stood motionless. Then:  
“Give me your hand, Bellatrix Black.”  
He didn't stir as she extended her left hand.  
“The other hand, if you will.”  
She checked the droop of her shoulders, fought off the urge to hiss between her teeth and calmly swapped hands with all the poise and grace she might have employed had this merely been a stranger about to bestow a kiss upon the incorrect fingers at a ball, rather than the man in whose very orbit she travelled bestowing quite possibly the most petty, humiliating disappointment of her life. All those etiquette lessons hadn't quite gone to waste, she reflected. Then she flinched at his touch.  
“Does Death himself hold your hand Bellatrix?”  
Lord Voldemort tightened his frigid, bony grip and Disapparated them both.

Bellatrix inhaled the summer evening and revelled in it. She could smell the warmth, feel the grass, hear the swans gliding along the river. Nothing could spoil this! Even the fingers interlaced with hers were pleasantly cool as they released her.  
“Swart Hall, as the Lady wishes,” murmured her Lord in amusement.  
Despite her suddenly improved mood, Bellatrix considered that it might be further ameliorated if the Dark Lord were to cease being quixotic and just _go away_. (She would be quite happy for him to return when he had transformed into his usual distant omnipotence, she amended, wondering uneasily if he were still reading her mind.)  
“Leave then, Miss Black.”  
Once again he suddenly wore Antonin's features and voice and stance. She breathed in: no transfiguration then, merely illusions to appeal to sight and hearing.  
“It would look very odd for Antonin Dolohov to abandon me to my own birthday party, would it not?” she questioned cautiously.  
He crooked his wand arm and she linked it with her own. The fine wool of his white tie concealed contours that were distinctly not Antonin's, yet her glance told her otherwise. For a moment Bellatrix regretted her transfiguration choice of a sleeveless gown. Yet conjuring gloves would indicate weakness and she was not about to permit him another minor victory.  
“Not leaving an old Dark Arts Master to his solitude then, Miss Black?”  
“That's two simple traps which you laid for me in as many minutes. Could my Lord possibly feel sorry for me?”  
“You are obliged to spend most of the evening with your relatives.”  
“Not if I hex them first!”  
She was rewarded with a laugh as they crunched over the gravel. The banter came easily, as long as she pretended that he was who he seemed.  
“Have I chanced upon the rare woman who actively wants chivalry to die?”  
“Would you rather I long for some knight in shining armour to whisk me to the dance floor instead?”  
“Under the assumption that fewer guests would suffer mortal injuries, certainly. However your shoes might make a liar of me.”  
“Do tell me which Concilium members have to stand at the next meeting. I'll refrain from dancing with them.”  
“You know very well that I will not disclose that sort of information!” he chided, “Perhaps not yet, at any rate.”  
The pair skirted the fountain and the question of Bellatrix' loyalties.  
“Impasse, then.”  
“The obvious solution to our impasse is to take my chances with you myself.”  
“I daresay that you dance better than Rodolphus, my Lord.”  
“You seem very well informed for someone who has never had the courage to join me.”  
“I never imagined that you would do me the honour of asking.”  
“Whom else would I ask? There are few other ladies in my ranks.”  
“Evan Rosier, for one!”  
“Convinced that he dances to Snape's tune, are you? How interesting!”  
A flash of magic ushered them over the threshold of her family manor. The surreal pressure lifted as the quasi-Antonin arm disengaged from her own.  
“Bellatrix!”  
Blinking in the shadowed atrium, Bellatrix didn't see who had hailed her until he was upon them.  
“Rodolphus, _mon cher, ça va_?”  
“ _Bon Anniversaire_! I left your present with the house elves, _ma chérie_ — do let me Crucio them if they have drunk it all.”  
They embraced briefly. Her fiancé caught sight of her guest and started. He stepped back awkwardly and cut a short bow.  
“My Lord! Good evening.”  
Out of the corner of her eye she saw that he had metamorphosed again, into the public façade that went by another name and an unremarkable bloodline. He replied in impeccable, Parisian French, regarding the elder Lestrange brother from such a height and with such inscrutable, fathomless blue eyes that they marked him with the finest ancestry of all.  
As Rodolphus retreated to mingle with less intimidating guests, the Dark Lord remarked softly, “The poor man ought to be spared for one night.”  
Still staring at her fiancé's path across the room, Bellatrix merely nodded imperceptibly.  
“Good evening, Bellatrix.”  
She never heard him Disapparate, too occupied with searching the room for the man who wasn't there.

“In for a Galleon, Antonin?”  
Dolohov was not to be distracted from the quiver he was examining.  
“What's the wager, Rabastan?”  
“The usual.”  
“Oh very well, then. A Galleon each on Beltane this year and next... Does this arrow need more Elixir of Agrumentum?”  
“Fool!”  
The mirth in the younger Lestrange's voice made his companion glance upwards.  
“I _had_ intended a wager on which of us would survive, but I'll certainly keep your long-range forecasting of my brother's wedding in mind!”  
His voice turned suddenly sharp.  
“And keep that damned poison off my books!”  
Antonin had waved an arrow mockingly under Rabastan's nose at mention of the eternally hypothetical wedding. A drop of potion spattered onto the carpet nearby and began digesting it.  
“Hardly your books Lestrange Minor! What would your brother say?”  
He watched the other man finish his spell-copying and carefully lay aside the book, reaching for another in silence. Impatient, uncaring of whatever fraternal fault-line he had struck, Antonin notched an arrow and let the shaft slide between his fingers. Satisfied with the aerodynamics, he reached for another. For a while the pair worked in relatively companionable silence.  
“I didn't know that he concerned you. He'll be ever so touched,” murmured Rabastan.  
He had finished with the final volume and shot his dark gaze across the closed tome. Antonin fought to meet his eyes, keeping his tone light:  
“I barely know the man. I merely wish him good fortune, asking Brünnhilde to share his marriage bed!”  
“A Valkyrie, is she?”  
The deliberate carelessness of his voice made Antonin wonder whether he grappled with some unseen emotion as well. Had both the Lestranges been arranging ties with the Black family when Andromeda had so disgraced herself? Their family hardly needed the gold, he reflected, thinking bitterly of his own paucity and the fortunes which had fallen with Tsar Nicholas. Antonin forced himself to speak again:  
“If she truly is Mistress of the Valkyries, surely the Dark Lord should have her!”  
The weak jest was not improved by the other's attempt to surpass it.  
“Siegfried and Brünnhilde? Ha, 'the foolish knave who knows no fear!' Unlike us.”  
Magical Law Enforcement records safely returned, Lestrange Minor had taken up position beside the door. His partner remained lounging in the left-hand chair before the desk. Balancing his ankle on his knee, his foot conducted to an unheard, agitated tempo. The only camouflage here was to hide in plain sight and plain clothes, weaving a disguise of honesty and loyalty. A pulse of magic and the fireplace flickered to life. Antonin ceased to figit and sat upright. The various Dark detectors about the room remained lifeless. The door clicked open.  
“Minister! Good evening! May I take your coat?”  
Lestrange Minor smiled jocularly.  
“Yes, yes, thank you de Valmy.”  
He deftly removed the overcoat and briefcase from the elderly woman's hand. The free hand waved itself in Dolohov's direction.  
“Pour a brandy for our guest, will you?”  
The most powerful bureaucrat in wizarding Europe collapsed into a winged chair behind her desk, wearing a smart set of pinstriped robes and a frown. The Minister took the glass 'de Valmy' proffered and drank it at a gulp, gesturing for another. Antonin took cautious sips of his, light-headed already from adrenalin.  
“Half the damned Auror department is absent on some wild Snorkack chase, Muggle Relations are going on strike, but Albus Dumbledore is still here, as ever!”  
The Minister leaned forwards, examining the arrows arrayed on the desk.  
“And you think this will finish him off, do you Mr. Dolohov?”  
“It was the least that the Knights of Walpurgis could do, Madame Minister.”

Druella and Cygnus Black were not at all pleased. Cygnus paced the vast ballroom like a caged Grimm. His bass registered an unusual note of anxiety tonight.  
“Once, just once, I would like our eldest daughter to behave herself!”  
When she was only mildly cross (a frequent state for a pure-blood witch with three daughters) their mother tended to shout. Not so when she was truly angry, marking her rage with furious whispers.  
“Be quiet! Cygnus, a guest might hear—”  
“She Apparates, (late, if you please!) on her own parents' front lawn, doesn't bother with a carriage—”  
The guests were now on that very lawn, rendering the ballroom empty for a brief while. Druella stood in a shaft of evening sunlight, watching them.  
“—Half of Europe's old families have turned out for this, Merlin knows how many eavesdropping hexes are circling—”  
Cygnus glanced up at his wife's words, examining one of the chandeliers as if he could spy an enchantment hanging amongst the unlighted candles. It didn't stall his rumbled tirade:  
“—I cannot imagine what possessed her to waltz up to our doorstep with the Dolohov heir—”  
“—not to mention the thrice-cursed Ministry snoops, I'll wager that half the catering staff are Aurors-in-training—”  
Druella's sharp gaze was fixed on the blessedly oblivious but frightfully costly waiters, doubtless looking for one she could hex for an imperfectly-straightened bow tie.  
“—transpires that this Dolohov fellow is in fact only pretending to be so. Oh, I shudder to think, if his _alibi_ is a dispossessed White Russian—”  
“—never have happened in my grandsire's day! Why, even Lord Lestrange or Lord Malfoy would have thought twice before attempting any espionage on the Rosier estate—”  
“—social standing of this unseemly mysterious gentleman might be!”  
“—quality of the guests is going downhill as well! That painting—”  
“What's wrong with my guests, Mother? You hate that painting, in any case.”  
Bellatrix strode into the room, gown billowing about her ankles like breaking waves.  
“That is a decidedly infeminine gait, young lady!”  
“Good evening to you as well, Father!” she riposted impishly.  
Emboldened by the night's earlier successes, she spared a moment to wave at the draped canvas stretching nearly the length of the room, knowing that it would provoke him. For the gesture showed a duellist's wand arm, the lines of her muscles exaggerated by the willowy build of her mother's line. The flush of triumph faded. Her father was already in a state of near apoplexy, Bellatrix noted with dismay. She turned away to her mother at once.  
“Mother? You seem preoccupied.”  
Druella Black gazed wordlessly at her daughter. How to explain, what had been lost in the civil war of her grandsire's age? What might be gained again, but not by her daughter. She would not put Bellatrix into the front lines, would not allow her to be put there by some Gryffindor-reckless passion. She quietly cursed her cleverness in naming this one.  
“The painting,” prompted her daughter gently.  
“Ah, you have always seen it empty, have you not? Tonight it will be unveiled and...”

Her parents' ire towards the painting was readily explained by its cost: the past decade had seen the endless canvas restored. Each individual figure had to be chaperoned off to a pre-existing portrait, Galatean enchantments reworked on them one by one, while the main canvas was carefully examined and painstaking maintenance performed on the scenery. Even cousin Sirius, two years her elder, had not seen the painting. He never would now, making a mockery of all those Yule nights they had spent theorising over an especially precious and expensive thing in a world full of them. The two of them had egged each other on to increasingly perilous eavesdropping: Sirius had sworn that Orion and Cygnus had been arguing over placing a dowry in such a prominent position and she herself recalled a protracted screaming match over the finances of the country manor marking her first evening at the Blacks' ancestral, urban stronghold.  
“...depicting your great-grandsire's marriage celebrations has no less an august personage than Lord Marius Marvolo dancing in it, newly wed to Ginevra Valery; there is also your brother-in-law's great-great grandsire, Lord Petrus Malfoy and...”  
Both Valery and Marvolo lines were extinct and of no interest to her now. Bellatrix picked over the gossiping amongst the five of them: her and Siri, then Meddy and later Cissy and Regulus (who was so pretentious that he had refused a nickname) sequestered from the adults celebrating in the forbidden rooms below. They had spanned the decade between the eldest and youngest of them not out of friendship but necessity, knowing almost instinctively that something had to bind them before the strictures of Houses and separate years at Hogwarts prised them apart. The quintet had pursued each other with spells and pranks, sometimes calling a truce to spin endless tales of what the ballroom and dining hall might look like; how it might echo; whether the food would taste different off an adult's plates.  
“...of course your father's ancestors are amongst the crowd somewhere...”  
Bellatrix regretted reining in her wandering mind: Mother had been born a Rosier and she never let her daughters forget it. Oh, the Blacks had ranked highly enough and maintained their status for century upon century, but their blood had never reached the stellar heights of the dozen highest-ranking families across the Wizarding world. They had never died out either. There was something to be said for that when only Malfoy and Rosier remained from that august group. Nevertheless, Druella was especially fond of comparison to Aunt Walburga who had borne the surname Black even before she had married. Perhaps that was why her cousins had never been quite right. Was that why there was only her and Cissy now?  
“...imagine the difficulty in finding portraits of them? So many possessions of those families who had died fighting were confiscated by the new ruling bourgeoisie...”  
She remembered shepherding her first-year sister between classes at Hogwarts, skimping on NEWT revision to teach her all the hidden passageways and ways to bribe Peeves or the house-elves. They had only had a year together in its halls. That Andromeda, promoted to Slytherin Prefect and all the common-room politics which came with it, would not always come to her aid, had not been a fact easily explained to her sister. _But Regulus will start next year and your brave Cissy is a girl of twelve now, I can look after him! And I don't need a Prefect to look after me — why, you weren't one and you have done a much better job than Meddy!_ Bellatrix pushed the memories away with effort. Now her mother's voice was a welcome distraction:  
“...a fine present for you, to see your ancestors and their peers come to life! What do you think, Bella dear?”  
“In my opinion,” she began confidently.  
(Inventing strategy on the spur of the moment had always worked for her in duels.)  
“What opinion, Bellatrix? Too busy daydreaming to pay respectful attention to your mother, weren't you?” barked Cygnus.  
Her hand itched for a wand. Perhaps to cast that petrification curse which Antonin had taught her, or a more Slytherin silencing spell that gave the illusion that she heard her father's words while he spoke to thin air. She brushed aside the temptation. Women of proper standing did not carry wands at social events.  
“That is most unfair Father! Mother's explanation of the guests was certainly more interesting than the family précis in _Nature's Nobility_.”  
There was no small measure of truth in that. After all, the book had been useful as a sleeping aid in her first weeks at Hogwarts (and in later years for hitting her cousins about the shins) and had vanished Merlin-knew-where afterwards.  
“Bella, dear,” reiterated her mother, then gave the kind of significant pause that heralded either the Imperius Curse or banishment from the family tree, “Is there perhaps something that you want to tell us?”  
Bellatrix blinked. She had thought the Dark Lord was one for non-sequiturs, but this?  
“What your mother wants to know before the guests come waltzing in here is what in the name of the Furies is going on! Where have you been this evening? The clock in the hall showed your name at 'Mortal Peril' for several minutes! Not to mention when it flicked to 'Romant—'”  
“That was _in error_ , as you may have deduced from the amount of time the arrow lingered there,” snapped Bellatrix. “So was 'Mortal Peril' actually, considering that I was accompanied by the—”  
She had almost forgotten the Polyjuice.  
“—a first-class duellist. It was merely a lesson.”  
Hades, this was going to be difficult. How many deceptions was she expected to weave at once? 

“We believe that 'the Greater Good' is an overwhelmingly dangerous concept, Madame Minister. Why, we believed in it wholeheartedly once!” Antonin sobered his voice before continuing, “Before we saw that something so nebulous would undoubtedly be turned to enforce less altruistic goals.”  
“You suggest that Mr. Dumbledore has not abandoned his scheme. Does his capture and betrayal of a former...co-conspirator...not indicate otherwise?”  
A manifold array of possible answers danced in his mind, just out of reach while he tried to decide which one she might like. Eventually, he lied with the truth.  
“Dumbledore turned upon and defeated Grindelwald, that is indisputable, historical fact. His reasons for doing so are not. Certainly the old man would like us to believe that he had a century to meditate on the follies of his youth and that he was at last compelled to correct them.”  
“You are too generous, Mr. Dolohov! Or else his youth lasted into the reaches of middle age. He made no attempt to prevent Grindelwald from coming to power on the Continent before the last of the Muggle wars.”  
“Quite so! But the coast of France is a strenuous Apparition journey away and across a Magical Revenue and Customs border, both barriers to an idle mind.”  
“The 'old man''s mind is far from idle.”  
He hastened to correct his implication. Bloody useless language, English!  
“No, of course not! But his desire to counter an old friend _was_ , at least until he saw the next Dark Lord on the horizon and the thought of them in alliance forced his hand—”  
“These new, what are they?”  
Dolohov remained silent. This was not a test for him.  
“Death Eaters, Madame Minister,” supplied Lestrange Minor, “Led by a certain Lord Voldemort.”  
“Thank you, de Valmy. Such a fine secretary I have!”  
The Minister returned her attention to Dolohov.  
“How ever did you make each other's acquaintance?”  
Lestrange Minor rescued him from that neatly:  
“Scholarly exchange, Mme. Minister. A year-long swap between Beauxbatons and Hogwarts.”  
Well, that was true enough. The Lestranges, their father despairing of the likes of that Mudblood Dumbledore as Headmaster, had packed their things for southern Europe's premier wizarding academy, while the family itself moved into their previously-abandoned mansion on the Cote d'Azur just in time to avoid some nasty property tax laws.  
“I was the successful applicant from the English side of the channel and roomed with de Valmy for four terms. Rather a novel experience, there was more of a focus at Beauxbatons on—”  
“ _Les beaux arts_ ,” supplied the Minister.  
“Precisely.”  
Indeed, if someone were to contact either school and ask for details of the exchange, the cover story would hold. They wouldn't even have to use Rookwood to fake the correspondence. The pair of them had speculated about that for a while, which spy would be trusted enough for Dumbledore to leave them in his office unwatched, but rapidly came to the conclusion that they didn't know. More precisely, that neither of them wanted to know.  
“Did you ever contact the successful French applicant? You must have had some fascinating experiences to share about the education system,” probed the Minister.  
Hades, was the cursed Board of Studies about to strike as well? This was not the direction which this interview was supposed to take! The thought didn't quite float into his consciousness and he was careful to avoid eye contact, but he knew that an idea was lurking in his mind. A skilled Legilimens would see it, that the elder Lestrange had gone to Hogwarts, Sorted into Bellatrix' year in Slytherin.  
“If he did, we never heard about it when he returned!” commented Lestrange Minor. “No, he was far too wound up about some English girl to discuss the comparative merits of the two schools!”  
All three of them laughed.  
“Poor man,” murmured the Minister for Magic, perhaps in jest. “We do so often set our hearts on what might destroy us, do we not?”

Cygnus and Druella scanned the crowd again, mentally noting with whom each of their daughters had danced. Which guests had danced with which others more than once; whose hands clung too easily to another's; whose lips brushed too long against a lady's knuckles; such things had mattered once. Before the war, in a world they had never known.  
“He's gone again!” exclaimed Druella.  
“Yes, the brother is missing too, but he would hardly be in a moonlighted corner of the gardens with Narcissa!”  
“Any more than Rodolphus Lestrange would be with our Bellatrix! No, I wanted to show you our mystery...what does Bellatrix call Sirius these days?...'gate-crasher.'”  
“Ah,” rumbled Cygnus.  
From somewhere behind him came the absent noise of a large group of people determinedly refusing to laugh. The pair of them, as with everyone in the room, was watched: their illustrious ancestors were having conniptions at the dismal failures of their progeny. Kind of them, thought Cygnus. Their names were already burned into the history books.  
“Bonsoir Madame, Monsieur Black!”  
Their potential son-in-law strolled over, with Avery, Rosier and Wilkes in tow.  
“Monsieur Lestrange, are you enjoying the evening?”  
“Very much, Madame! I feared that your daughter might dance me into exhaustion, but I appear to have the upper hand this evening.”  
Sensing the trajectory of their conversation, young Evan scuttled off to talk to safer people than his aunt. Druella noted that her favourite nephew had dragged the rest of Lestrange Major's coterie off with him.  
“Yes, Bellatrix has been working very hard at her new post with the Department of Mysteries. We are ever so pleased that she had the marks.”  
“So I have heard! Your daughter must be very proud.”  
Was that a hint of laughter in his voice? No, it was scorn, she decided, that a Black might need to resort to academic achievement where once the name alone would have been sufficient.  
“I shall leave that for her to discuss, Monsieur.”  
“It is rather a shame that Bellatrix hasn't yet joined me in the Auror department,” her fiancé remarked wistfully.  
Preposterous notion! No Black would ever disgrace themselves by upholding the laws that had destroyed pure-blood, wizarding culture. It never occurred to Druella to ask why the Lestranges might have pushed their sons into Ministry positions.  
“Yet such a relief for us, when I remember the number of letters I received from Hogwarts on our eldest's incessant duelling in the corridors!”  
Judging by his expression, most of Lestrange Major's champagne had just gone up his nose.  
“Oh, yes,” he coughed, “I was caught in the crossfire more than once in my year there. Frequently by the Transfiguration Misstress, much to my dismay. At least the Potions Master used to mark our behaviour down to an over-exuberance of House spirit.”  
“Dear old Horace Slughorn! He must have been _so_ helpful in making a foreigner feel welcome. I certainly remember his social gatherings from my time at Hogwarts.”  
“The gentleman certainly hasn't lost his taste for them! He comes to France all the time, always introducing another celebrity-or-other. One day all that _foie gras_ will give him fatal indigestion.”  
Druella made sympathetic clucking noises.  
“I mustn't get my hopes up!” giggled Bellatrix.  
Fortunately Lestrange Major was too busy admiring her daughter to see the venomous look directed upon her by her mother. How had Bellatrix bought a dress as daring as her spirit?  
“All those 'Slug Club' meetings might have been mere social fencing for the gentlemen,” continued Bellatrix, “But for the ladies—”  
“Ah, come now chérie, the professor was not such a rake! It was the other students who ought to have concerned you. That cousin of yours—”  
He broke off swiftly. For want of something to do, he turned to place his empty glass on a nearby table.  
“Former cousin, thank you!” snapped Druella.  
Her daughter seized Lestrange Major's now-empty wand hand and began leading him back towards the dance floor proper. He offered no resistance, conversing readily.  
“ _Quand j'ai vu elle avec qui tu discutait, il fallait que je vienne de ton aide!_ ” Bellatrix was exclaiming.  
“ _Peux-tu t'imaginer le contre-interrogatoire que ta mère a preparé pour moi?_ ”  
Rodolphus was clearly teasing her, but he seemed harmless enough.  
“ _Mais oui!_ ” She adopted a sharp falsetto, continuing, “ _'Ma jeune fille Narcisse est déja mariée! En outre, elle est enceinte avec un fils! Pourquoi ne vous êtes-vous pas marié sa soeur ancienne Bellatrix?'_ ”  
She clutched at his arm in mirth at her imitation of her mother. Bah! What did Bellatrix think it mattered to Druella that Narcissa's engagement had lasted as many months as her sister's had years, or that Narcissa was soon expecting a son while Bellatrix was adamant about remaining childless in her youth? (“The early middle age of one's seventies is the time for Wizarding mothers to think of that sort of burden!” had been her daughter's last word on the topic before storming out to hex Andromeda's Head Girl badge to yell rude words at passers-by.) Druella watched them walk away, every tilt of the head and gesture of the arm a message which she no longer needed to decipher.

The crackle of the fire had been the only sound for some time. Even the leather of his luxurious chair had become uncomfortable after so long examining maps and charts. Antonin wondered how the Minster coped, sitting at a desk all day. He spared a glance for the other Death Eater in the room: poor Rabastan had remained standing, moving only to provide instruments and spell surveying maps to float over the desk.  
“The Hogsmeade option is the simplest target, but it doesn't carry the political capital which the assassination in London would.”  
“Yes, but difficult to explain how Dumbledore would die and his puppet Fudge remain alive. Surely any serious terrorist group would kill a Ministry official on principle,” he expostulated.  
The cold response was quick: “You're the terrorist Dolohov, you tell me.”  
“Touché, Madame Minister. While the Knights of Walpurgis are adamant in their desire to see Grindelwald's death revenged, we no longer wish to cause any excessive casualties.”  
“These Death Eaters, on the other hand...”  
“Would readily murder a Ministry official, even one as foolish as Cornelius Fudge,” interjected her secretary.  
“Surely the man realises that he would only be Dumbledore's mouthpiece?” Dolohov wondered aloud.  
“Ah, but that is sufficient for some people. Having the title without the burden of decision-making. Fudge would quite happily allow Dumbledore and his 'Greater Good' to take control and then we would have that messy situation on the Continent all over again.”  
She glanced at the Death Eater, clearly amused at his restraint. Or what would amount to restraint, were he actually a Knight of Walpurgis rather than someone plotting to hammer the final nail into their coffin.  
“To sum up, then: the London option is our first priority, provided that we can keep Fudge from Dumbledore, with the Hogsmeade option held in reserve. Poor, brave de Valmy here will selflessly give his life to shield you from the sniper and the attempt on you life will remove you from any suspect list.”  
“No-one will notice the Disapparition when I time it properly,” echoed Lestrange Minor.  
“A few impressive-looking but harmless injuries will not prevent me from instituting a thorough investigation into the murderers of Albus Dumbledore, including passing crisis measures within the Auror department,” added the Minister.  
“Said department will shortly discover that the attack was planned by this new terrorist group; the Unforgivable Enabling Act will ensure that few, if any, top Death Eaters are taken alive; thus no contrary evidence will be heard, I trust,” continued Dolohov.  
“Evidence from those refused bail and sent to Azkaban before a court appearance is never taken at face value...and prisoners who required the Cruciatus Curse to disarm them are known to be so unreliable,” the Minister confirmed.  
“The destruction of the Death Eaters will stop this new Dark Lord in his rise and Dumbledore's death will neutralise the threat of 'the Greater Good' while those of us foolish enough to have been ex-Knights of Walpurgis remain quiescent on British soil. The Ministry will continue under its present, venerable leadership and all will be well,” Dolohov concluded.  
The three of them shook hands. The implicit snares of loyalty enchantments took hold, but these were mere formalities, none of them the Unbreakable Vow.  
“Good evening, Mr. Dolohov. You are dismissed for the night, de Valmy.”  
The pair of Death Eaters left the Minister for Magic's office in silence. It was two staircases and an atrium later before they spoke.  
“Thank Merlin that's over!” murmured Antonin. “Care for a drink at the Leaky Cauldron?”  
“Why not,” Lestrange Minor shrugged. “No, banish that. My brother is covering for me at some party or other. I was invited, thought I might as well reinforce the alibi by pretending I've been there all night. Why not join me?”  
Antonin suddenly recalled an un-opened parchment bearing the Black crest. A scroll thrown into the fire in jealously one evening, while _her_ owl looked on, scandalised. The elder brother of the man next to him had been the cause of that petty revenge. But Rabastan was not his brother, neither in temperament nor taste for women. He mutely examined the wizard tossing Floo powder into the public fireplace.  
“Your Brünnhilde might be there!” Rabastan teased, catching his eye.  
“Swart Hall, main grate!” he added, vanishing into the green flames before Antonin could retort.  
Shaking his head, Antonin followed.

Bellatrix curiously stared at a pretty witch with red-gold hair. The figure raised her glass in mock salute, a smile playing about her lips. The vast painting having been unveiled, most of its newly-reunited ball-goers had immediately began chatting amongst themselves excitedly after a decade of solitary confinement. The tall, pale-eyed witch was not one of them. Evidently none of _her_ descendants was the subject of ruthless gossip amongst the other long-dead revellers. Honestly, they were even noisier than the actual guests! The darkness of early morning had long since conquered the early evening's sunlight and most of the guests would soon leave. Bellatrix idly observed the painted lady turn away to speak to a witch, newly-arrived from the dance floor and so similar that they must have been twins. She felt a twinge of sorrow, chased away by a flash of fury. Andromeda and her foolish prattlings of 'true love,' a Slytherin harping about 'right' and 'truth-telling!' The eldest Black sister glared at the contently oblivious, oil-painted siblings. Their dance partner, tall, dark-haired and pale, gifted the eavesdropper with a disapproving glance that would function equally well as a Killing Curse. Bellatrix scowled back in defiance. A smartly-pillowcased house elf provided the trio with new glasses of champagne. She supposed that she ought to find one as well. Her mind had barely been made up before someone placed a glass in her hand.  
“Good evening, Miss Black.”  
“My Lord! I thought that you had retired before the celebrations started?”  
He shrugged politely, a lithe motion that was inhumanly elegant.  
“Your parents' library contains some rather fascinating volumes.”  
How had he charmed them so swiftly into allowing a guest to wander the shelves of banned books alone? She remembered Cygnus and Druella's state of near-apoplexy hours beforehand. Especially when neither of them seemed to recognise the gifted sorcerer for what he was! Perhaps there had been time, while Bellatrix had rattled off a few healing charms, bathed and dressed before confronting her parents. Yet another confrontation which would never had happened, had she not been drawn towards the Dark Lord and the new, shining age he offered. The wizard watched her in silence.  
“Did you like what you saw, my Lord?”  
“Perhaps.”  
“Surely you did not spend hours cloistered in the library for mere ambivalence?”  
The classically handsome smile which was not his own flashed into existence.  
“You are too observant for your own good, Bella. Or safety, for that matter. You are quite correct, I had other business tonight.”  
He sipped at the champagne, obviously deliberating how much to lie.  
“Merely confirming a minor, but vital change of detail in a few records.”  
“Confirming the actions of an asset entrusted to no-one else,” she hazarded.  
“Precisely.”  
The warning in those few syllables prickled along her spine.  
“Dance with me, Bellatrix,” he said suddenly.  
“Pardon?”  
“You offered, no, _challenged_ me to a dance earlier tonight. The penultimate tango plays even as we speak.”  
The orchestra had indeed struck a melody familiar to Bellatrix from countless balls. Countless times that Antonin had dared to whisk her about the dance floor under her fiancé's very gaze. Innumerable hours of practising, both in the Slytherin common room and on holidays, Cissy paired with Regulus, Meddy and her taking turns with Sirius when he was hexed into attending. Suddenly the parquetry of the ballroom was the wood of a challenge floor and her eldest cousin seemed to stand there with drawn wand... No, this was not a tango that she would have danced. Not tonight, not even with Antonin. Yet somehow her glass was empty, although Bellatrix could not remember taking a single sip; the last strains of the tango were finishing; pairs were assembling for the next dance and the Lestranges were nowhere to be seen.  
Shadows filled the Dark Lord's voice.  
“Come to me, Bellatrix.”  
Whatever propelled her into his orbit was not Imperius. 

The pair strode to the dance floor with a duellist's gait, an easy grace which parted the knots of guests before them. Just in time, for the chamber orchestra struck the opening chords and propelled the couples into motion. For a few bars, Bellatrix maintained her silence. Long fingers squeezed her own in warning at an indrawn breath. Bellatrix quashed the question in her throat and mutely examined her partner. For all his grace and swiftness, his gaze was focused elsewhere while he seemingly concentrated upon the waltz. The tempo was unusually, treacherously rapid, but that was no hindrance to her, nor any other well-educated pure-blood. Another puzzle, one she decided to abandon for tonight.  
“Would you kill him for me, Bellatrix?”  
“Who, my Lord?”  
“Lestrange, Dolohov, does it matter? If I were to command a death with no more information than my instruction, would you undertake it?”  
“Yes, my Lord.”  
“The answer which I ought already to have heard! No, you would not. They do matter, these men in your life, else you would not have questioned me.”  
“My Lord! I am your faithful subordinate, I have proven that by now. I have killed in your name already.”  
“Despite that, you are faithful to two others as well.”  
She was silent as they executed a box step. The neat, right-angled turn sent the pair gliding along the longer side of the rectangular floor.  
“Lucius' marriage to my sister does not prevent him from serving you, nor Rodolphus engagement to me. Why should our upcoming marriage be a different state of affairs?”  
“They are both in the Concilium and...unencumbered...by their social attachments, that is true. However, neither of them will ever seek to proclaim themselves my right hand. Given your determination, your passion for my cause, you will undoubtedly be unsatisfied with anything less.”  
Neither of them had missed a step, for all that the noise from the orchestra was distant in Bellatrix' ears.  
“In the coming year, you plan to give your name to Mr. Lestrange and your soul to Mr. Dolohov. In light of that, does your loyalty not sound too eager to be true, even to your own ears?”  
Bellatrix continued waltzing, unable to articulate her thoughts. Yes, she wanted Antonin Dolohov over Rodolphus Lestrange. That was obvious. Irrefutable, given the lengths to which the Dark Lord had gone to fulfil the mental apex of their duel. Why should he compare himself to a mere mortal? That Basilisk stare was directed at her again. This time she met it. _You are my master, too terrible to love. Condescending to share your life with me, to give me fierce joy even when you have none. Why have you none?_  
“Faithful Bella.”  
The dance was drawing to a close.

“By the Furies, you missed all the fun, have you not?”  
Lestrange Major leaned against the mantelpiece, watching his brother perform a few soot-repelling charms. Dolohov took the elder Lestrange's hand gratefully and found himself hauled from the fireplace onto a fine, albeit rather sumdged, Turkish rug. He copied Rabastan's spell-work before transfiguring his clothing from neutral, anonymous work robes to a respectable set of white tie and tails.  
“Done? Come on, let's see whose feet my fiancée has broken in my absence,” Lestrange Major remarked.  
“How did you know to wait for us?” Dolohov asked.  
“Oh, I knew that you two would never pass up a party,” he responded vaguely.  
They walked swiftly along a passageway, past the open doors of an intriguingly cavernous library and down the stairs to the atrium.  
“I can't hear the orchestra,” Rabastan commented.  
“Good for you, your dancing skills are hopeless!”  
“Just because you have all the practice—”  
“Oh, by Merlin, can't you two shut up?” Antonin smothered a yawn. “Now where's that drink you promised?”  
They fought against the tide of couples leaving the atrium to Disapparate in the darkness outside. Dolohov waved his greetings to the Black patriarch, cornered by a chatty couple who wouldn't be leaving any time soon and dodged Rodolphus' usual coterie. Both Lestranges had managed to avoid the limpet-like tendencies of Wilkes and his friends, so Dolohov hurried to catch up with them. As he entered the ballroom, the real reason for Lestrange's watch strode calmly to greet them, Bellatrix on his arm. Dolohov murmured the required greeting, noting that he wasn't the only wizard unable to tear his eyes from the witch.  
“You all enjoyed yourselves?” he questioned wryly.  
“Oh, yes, a most successful evening,” Lestrange Minor ventured.  
“Not a single misstep tonight, a refreshing change,” Antonin added.  
“Perhaps, given the departure of the other guests, we ought to follow their example?” posed Bellatrix, who was staring at something beyond Antonin's left ear.  
“Oh dear, can't we tempt you all to stay the night?”  
Druella Black had snuck up on them, her husband presumably still occupied with his never-departing, distant relatives.  
“I for one am utterly exhausted!” he heard.  
This was clearly the cue for similar protests from all of them.  
“Well then, at the very least, please allow my daughter to escort you to the manor's apparition boundary!”  
The Dark Lord broke his silence.  
“Are we so foolish to pay no heed to two entreaties in as many minutes? From two such fine examples of the Black family, as well.”  
Druella flushed and stammered something inadequate, looking at her daughter.  
“Mother, I'm afraid to say that I shall not stay the night either. I have a long report due tomorrow — today, by now! — and I simply have no choice but to finish it.”  
The furious expression directed at her led Antonin to wonder yet again how long Lestrange Major's parents-in-law would survive after the marriage. He suspected that Bellatrix would not be alone in praising her new husband's skill at assassination. The small group wandered into the night, hailed by disapproving, maternal clucking from one host and a bass exhortation of “Damn shame! Do come again!” from the other. 

Antonin had no objections to the silence pervading his companions. The Lestranges had fallen into step to left and right behind him, the trio following the Dark Lord as if they were retainers. Antonin's eyes lingered along the intricacies of Bellatrix' Mobius-like hairstyle. It was sufficiently late that his mind wandered freely, bereft of the discipline of adrenaline. He counted the pins, near-invisible in the night, imagination drawing a hundred possibilities of in which order to remove them; which staccato her heart would beat at his touch; which of his senses would shatter first, overwhelmed at her presence. He listened to the rustle of silk as her gown surged restlessly around her, counterpoint to the melody of unseen night insects and the noise of their feet along the gravel. An _allegro ben marcato_ , common time kept by the piano of the others' court shoes and the forte of tall heels. Tempo _a piacere_ of the Dark Lord, of course. Surely Bellatrix leant on his arm to keep up, for all that she never gave a single signal of discomfort. She had refused Antonin's aid, always, even in their school-days on endless, treacherous winter circuits of the lake while she vented her volcanic temper to the frozen air. The clasping of their arms was mere formality, an illusion worked in the name of social norms. Antonin allowed the thoughts to sink into the viscous eddies of his exhausted brain, leaving them to drown there. Rodolphus Lestrange was hardly jealous of the wrong man.  
“Our strategy proceeds, then?”  
He blinked. They had stopped at the end of the path. All the other guests had already Apparated home, for the garden was deserted.  
“We had no problems with the Ministry side of the plan, my Lord,” Lestrange Minor was saying.  
“No,” Antonin supplied, “The Minister was quite happy to allow us a shot at Dumbledore, all in the name of fortifying her throne against a successor.”  
“The Aurors have a few potential future Ministers in their ranks. This will discredit both them and the more bureaucratic candidates.”  
“Are you so sure of that, Lestrange Major?” questioned the Dark Lord.  
“Yes. I can make it so.”  
Only Bellatrix had not spoken. Of course, he thought, this would all be Mermish to her. Yet she was among their ranks now, the senior officers of the Death Eaters. He knew that she would stay.  
“What if the assassination fails?” she asked.  
“It doesn't matter. Whether he lives or dies, we will control the Minister. Should the current one live, the attempt will lead to new measures that centralise Auror command to a few, easily-Imperiused vetoes. And she's too much of a harpy to let Dumbledore or his supporters into politics. Should she die, given the resulting chaos and the opportunities for placing disinformation amongst the Aurors, well, Magical Law Enforcement and the Department of Mysteries are sufficiently powerful factions that we can promote whomever we choose.”  
“So even if the old man survives, he will think himself merely caught in the crossfire. How astute!” she laughed.  
“Not at all, Bellatrix,” the Dark Lord countered. “Having framed the Knights of Walpurgis as the co-conspirators, Dumbledore will seem the true target and the Minister the one with fatal misfortune.”  
“Should she turn against us—” began Lestrange Minor.  
“—She will, she will have to remove all traces of evidence—” interjected his brother.  
“—Then the last remains of Grindelwald's staff officers will be destroyed by the Ministry and their lower ranks will easily be recruited. The framing cannot possibly be traced, for I've been the Minister's Secretary for months, tonight just one top secret meeting of many.”  
“But Dolohov has no firm alibi. His movements are unaccounted for,” Lestrange Major pointed out.  
“He does, never fear.”  
Antonin noted the amusement in the Dark Lord's voice with no small trepidation.  
“Consider yourselves dismissed.”  
He vanished. They fell silent, contemplating the audacity of the task ahead.  
Eventually Lestrange Major spoke.  
“I have an Auror department to incite, it seems. Farewell to you all.”  
“If only I had my brother's capacity for working on an hour of sleep! I am heading home.”  
She alone kept him company now.  
“Do you truly have a report due, or was that just a feint for your mother?”  
Bellatrix laughed.  
“It can wait. But I truly refuse to stay the night under my parents' roof. I'll head for London, I think.”  
Her smile was the last sight of her to vanish, he fancied. Setting his mind to a destination, Antonin Disapparated.

The small flat was blessedly cool and dim. Even resetting the security wards held its own measure of restfulness. He wandered past the barometer-clock ticking its endless metronome in the hall, depositing his set of keys in a small crystal vase on the table beneath. The vase was handily enchanted to vanish anything placed inside, objects only appearing if the user knew that they were already there. The muffled hum of Muggle traffic carried from the next suburb, the only other sounds the creak of the stairs under his feet. A smell of polish hung in the air and the bannister was smooth to his touch. Antonin wandered into the bedroom, feeling the cool breeze gifted by the open window. At his entrance candles flickered to life. He stared at the bed and the vision upon it for an indeterminate time before lifting a hand to trace her face.  
“How did you know that I would be here?”  
She stretched, moving on the bed without opening her eyes.  
“I hardly imagined that the family would give you enough gold to buy another haunt for the Blacks in London.”  
His voice was over-loud in the night. A smile touched her lips at it.  
“No, Merlin knows where the family fortune will go with one male disowned for his morals and the other dispossessed of a brain.”  
“A dowry for you, perhaps?”  
His voice never wavered at the words. The giggle escaping her lips was too childlike for this topic, surely.  
“Not judging by Narcissa's sum! Miserly, miserable parents...”  
Her voice faded into exhaustion. He turned away, summoning a drink with a lazy wand motion and a wordless transfiguration. Placing it on the mantelpiece, he watched the ice dance within. _How foolish, wasteful of him!, to set his sights on anything but her_ , his mind nagged. He ignored it, staring at the ice not because he wanted to see it, but because he did not wish to see what he wanted. A careless shift of silk told his ears that Bellatrix had followed him. He turned to face her.  
“By the Furies! Where did those come from?”  
He stared at the sight of her, robes pooled on the polished wooden floor, a line of cuts and bruises on every curve.  
“You should have seen what they looked like before!” she laughed, “I was worried my Glamours wouldn't hold throughout the ball, but they did. At least I Healed most of the damage: Rodolphus has been teaching his Auror trainees that rather annoying insects-crawling-from-one's-skin curse. Not to mention the leprosy spells.”  
“That is not amusing! Oh, Gods, you were always hopeless at Healing. Why in Merlin's name were you busy with Magical Law Enforcement?”  
He rattled off spells, wand running over her body undirected by conscious thought.  
“Well...,” she began, “In the midst of raiding the Ministry's high-security vault, I was rescued by the Dark Lord, Polyjuiced into your image—”  
“Fine, I won't ask!”  
He threw up his hands in defeat, resisting the urge to cajole her into avoiding conflict. She had always managed to find a fight, ever since they had met, never shying from the front lines. One day they would take her from him.  
“Don't, Antonin!” she cried  
Her hand reached to slide against the stubble on his chin. He felt his shoulders slump, leaning his forehead against her collarbone.  
“How long, Bellatrix? When are you two going to resign yourselves to the fact that neither one will be killed off before you marry?”  
 _How long before this all ends?_ he wanted to ask, but did not dare. They had precious few nights together, too few to waste one in a quarrel. He felt his breath wash against her skin. Suddenly it was hard to refuse the urge to taste it. He wanted her, yet he did not, mind paralysed by the relentless paradox of over-tiredness, body too exhausted to admit sleep. Antonin allowed his fingers to wander over her skin, revelling in every subtle response he evoked.  
“What are you planning?”  
Her voice was gentle again, idly curious, even amused.  
“Memorizing you. If I cannot keep you, then your topology will have to do,” he countered.  
“You're turning me into a differential geometry exercise? A manifold with co-ordinate charts? A fond memory?”  
His fingers ceased their surveying. He ran them again over the Mark, recalling how his own had been raised and black for hours after his elevation to the Concilium. A mere curve on her surface, some fraction of her that was no longer her own, let alone his.  
“A happy memory, Bella? Not...exactly...more an indelible one, I hope. A memory for the day when what we will have had will be happy.”  
“ 'The flower of her youth will wither away. A husband will win her womanly favours.' ” she quoted.  
“Oh no, no Wagner! Not this early in the morning!” he chided.  
Lifting him easily, she started towards his bed, whistling a prelude to _Die Walküre_. Antonin buried his head against her neck to stifle his helpless laughter. The pair of them sprawled on the bed, content with mere proximity after too much time spent apart.  
“I was told to stay away from you, did you know?” she asked.  
“Hmmm?” he uttered.  
Her kisses began to trail against his cheek. Concentration was all too difficult. His hands still rested against her skin. In tacit apology, he traced them lower, casting aside the last of her garments. He sensed her muscles respond to the motion. Her hand caught urgently in his hair.  
“Not so directly, of course. I was instructed to spare my fiancé for a night.”  
“Disobeying orders, are you?” he murmured, not intent on an answer.  
Her voice was as breathless as his own.  
“Ah, but I have spared him for the night. Is it not morning now?”  
He felt feverish at her touch. Antonin lifted his gaze to examine her properly. The early reaches of dawn blazed fire across her body. What fool would try to restrain her? She was a Valkyrie, not lightly tamed.


End file.
